


Immensely Undesirable

by JehanFerres, olliereeder (JehanFerres)



Category: The Thick Of It
Genre: Anxiety Disorder, Depression, Eating Disorders, Gen, Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, Panic Attacks, depiction of violence in later chapters, mental illness talk, ollie has serious injuries, tw physical abuse
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-07-19
Updated: 2014-07-05
Packaged: 2017-12-20 17:46:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,763
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/890067
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JehanFerres/pseuds/JehanFerres, https://archiveofourown.org/users/JehanFerres/pseuds/olliereeder
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Come on, then," Glenn said, in his perpetually steady tone.</p><p>Ollie didn't.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. In Which Ollie Discovers an Alternate use for Clingfilm

**Author's Note:**

> a.k.a., Parker oppresses weasel-faced political underlings for his own personal enjoyment.
> 
> Malcolm is so difficult to write and so are titles GFDI.
> 
> Anyway yes the reason Ollie isn't as sassy as usual until the very end is because he has suffered from Major Bloodloss; he only managed to get to the office because of adrenaline, and probably looked like a fucking zombie en route.

Ollie was late. In fact, he was fifty seven minutes late for work (not that he was keeping track, because that would be weird, and there was fucking well nothing wrong with Ollie Reeder, no sir), and, if that bastard didn't then Malcolm was going to kill him or possibly even give him to Jamie to maim, which was probably the worst thing that could ever happen to him, Ollie was one lucky son of a bitch. However, from what he could hear, Ollie was vaguely aware that Malcolm was shouting at Glenn. Maybe he could sneak in and get to a bathroom and get away before Malcolm and Glenn noticed his injuries; it was probably just about doable, although he was fairly sure that somebody (as long as they weren't Jamie he was okay) was going to notice his injuries.

Still, it wouldn't be Malcolm, as he was shouting angrily at Glenn: "You're dead; you're as dead as unwanted fucking kittens in a Gucci bag with some fucking bricks on a working fucking farm and I'm the fucking farmer dumping the bag containing your fucking political career in the fucking pond because of this fucking colossal fucking COCK-UP, you washed-up, watery old fucking cunt!"

Ollie attempted to catch Glenn's eye (but failed; he was making a pathetic attempt to stare Malcolm down, which didn't entirely appear to be working: Malcolm was still raging at him and looking as though he was going to chop Glenn into little pieces and feed him to the ducks in Hyde Park). Instead, however, Ollie waited in the doorway of the room, swaying slightly as he attempted to keep his balance and to keep himself upright and breathing: he had a large wound from being hit with a belt above his left eye, a burn going up most of his right arm and sticking painfully to his sleeve, a large cut on the inside of his left arm and another on his lower jaw, along with a black eye, and four broken ribs, and a killer headache, which he was going to try to do something about. He was not entirely sure how he was meant to explain this: he really didn't want to tell the truth here because that would hurt too much.

Malcolm, however, suddenly turned to look in Ollie's direction: Ollie tensed but that was painful on his ribs and anyway it looked like Malcolm hadn't noticed and was looking right through him: Glenn looked mildly confused but he obviously hadn't actually taken in whatever had happened or the fact that Ollie was bleeding onto his shirt and the carpet (because the cuts had been this morning: the one on his arm was a defensive wound from trying not to get his eye cut out by-). However, Malcolm appeared to have noticed Ollie's presence; he snarled against, and hissed, "Go and bleed on something else you fucking bumboy," he snarled, before turning to Glenn, who had started to say something. "And you; you can go and do some fucking colouring while I try and fix the fucking MESS you've fucking well made here, if you can even manage to co-ordinate your fucking ham fists into that, you useless fucking creature from the black fucking political lagoon. You can even use Reeder's face as a fucking crayon," he snarled, glaring at Ollie, who had abruptly began to feel unbearably woozy and sick.

This, however, was only to be expected; getting attacked like that had not been expected at all and he was in a lot of pain as well because having two open wounds on his face, a black eye, an assortment of wounds on both his arms and what he assumed to be four broken ribs was not a good thing for him; this was not good at all. Suddenly, however, it became extremely dark and Malcolm started sounding even more frustrated and Ollie realised that his legs had given way and he was lying on the floor with his face pressed against the carpet, making it no easier to breathe: Malcolm kicked him roughly in the broken ribs, causing a sharp intake of breath at the pain but otherwise Ollie was too far out of it to be able to react.

Glenn looked on anxiously: otherwise, however, he didn't say a word for fear of offending Malcolm any more. This was probably a relatively sensible decision, as Malcolm was very unlikely to help Ollie out here, as were all of the others in the office.

"If you don't stop fucking well bleeding on my soft fucking furnishings within ten fucking seconds I will rip off your weedy fucking twig of a right arm and beat you halfway to Hong fucking Kong with the fucking bloody end!" Malcolm continued.

Ollie would have liked to stop bleeding, either on Malcolm's soft fucking furnishings or totally, but he was completely unable to move, or, indeed, to control how much he was bleeding. Instead, he exhaled heavily into the carpet: this was difficult and he couldn't breathe properly and it was horrifying. However, he still somehow managed to address the carpet, and say, "Too late," in a pained voice. Glenn made a distressed noise, but otherwise didn't react.

"What the fucking fuck do you fucking well fucking mean 'too fucking late', you fucking weasel-faced fucking degenerate?" Malcolm shouted, not used to being contradicted, as Ollie continued to stare at the carpet through rather clouded eyes. Glenn made a pitying sound but otherwise continued to stand by while Malcolm laid into Ollie.

"I mean 'too late'; like the... proverb'al early bird, the... the worm... has been got," Ollie mumbled, completely incoherent through pain and blood-loss, feeling as though he was going to pass out if he didn't get medical help of some form (hell, a couple of plasters and a cold tap would be better than the carpet and an extremely angry Glaswegian), and get it soon. "'Fucking hurts..." he mumbled.

"Oh for fuck's- you, get the useless fuck cleaned up," Malcolm ordered (he presumably was shouting at Glenn now), in a voice which seemed to be decreasing in volume: Ollie wasn't sure if this was because he was fainting or because Malcolm had tired of his bullying and gone to go and pick on somebody else or do whatever it was he did with Jamie when he was bored. Ollie guessed, from Glenn releasing a breath heavily, however, that he had left to go and do something else. This was of little comfort, as he was still only half-conscious and not entirely coherent, however.

"Come on, then," Glenn said, in his perpetually steady tone.

Ollie didn't.

Glenn helped him roll onto his back, and then helped him sit up. "Right. Where are you hurt?" he asked, having guessed that there were several more wounds than were instantly visible.

"Face, arms, ribs," Ollie replied. Glenn nodded. "Right side, about level with the third button of my shirt."

Glenn nodded (again) and then helped Ollie up, slinging the taller man's left arm over his shoulders and putting am arm around his waist and helped him limp in the direction of a disabled toilet. Ollie collapsed onto the seat, groaning and leaning his head back, as Glenn helped him get his jacket off and rolled up his sleeves. Once this was done and Glenn was getting medical supplies, Ollie loosened his tie and undid the top button of his shirt. After a couple of minutes, Glenn returned with bandages, alcohol gel, plasters (although what use they were going to be was completely lost on Ollie), cotton wool, tweezers, clingfilm, and another shirt (because he knew that Ollie always kept a spare around, and he knew where he kept it). Ollie was not entirely sure what that was for, nor how Glenn had been able to produce the roll of cling-film seemingly without leaving the office, but he couldn't co-ordinate his tongue well enough to ask, so he allowed Glenn to carefully dab at his left arm to find out how bad the cut was.

Unfortunately, it looked worse now that it was cleaned up and dried. It extended from his wrist to a couple of centimeters from his elbow, and was deeper towards the centre, looking to have been made by a relatively blunt knife: however, Glenn didn't comment (Ollie was leaning his head back against the wall with his eyes closed and a pained expression on his face while Glenn attempted to fix him up), and bandaged his arm up. He then turned his attention to the burn. The skin had blistered and looked painful, but it wasn't bleeding. Glenn pulled Ollie to his feet and ran the burn under cold water for about ten minutes, and then let Ollie collapse back down onto the seat again. He wrapped the clingfilm around the burn, and then set about cleaning up the cut on Ollie's jaw: this one was bad, but it had bled a hell of a lot as well, so wasn't quite as bad as it looked, being relatively shallow and extending from just below his ear to level with the edge of his lip, and it took Glenn a couple of minutes to get it cleaned up and dried, but Ollie slapped him away half-heartedly when he tried to put a plaster on the cut. Glenn left it alone, supposing that it being exposed to the elements wasn't really going to kill Ollie if he had survived this far, and helped Ollie take his shirt off and put the spare one on, rolling the sleeves up to his elbows.

After about five minutes, Glenn had put Ollie on a sofa (he had never until now seen the point of this sofa, but there you had it), upon which he was now lying on his back, while Glenn was sat on a chair a couple of metres away. Ollie was either asleep or unconscious, and Glenn considered the fact that he had always been expecting to be doing this after Ollie and Jamie were put in a room together, not Ollie and whoever had done this. He decided to give it a couple of minutes in the hopes that Ollie would recover at some point and possibly regain consciousness to give him some insight: the cuts were obviously fresh that morning, having had no time to heal in any way.

Before he could confront the issue, however, Malcolm and Jamie appeared in the doorway, Jamie talking loudly and explicitly about God-knows-what, while Malcolm didn't entirely appear to be a man who was paying attention to his companion. Admittedly, this was easy enough to do, because Jamie made limited sense, and all the necessary meaning of a sentence could be extracted by seeing how closely he resembled a large, angry wolf which hadn't been fed in a week.

At present, the wolf seemed preferable.

Glenn cast a pitying glance down at Ollie and made a dash for his desk. He was vaguely aware of Jamie cackling in an unhinged way in the background, but decided not to pay attention. Malcolm knew that Ollie had passed out, and even if he hadn't he could probably see that he was in no state to carry on working in any way, shape or form, as that much would have been evident to even the stupidest of people.

When Glenn looked back, Jamie was looking at him in a similar manner to one in which a ravened dog might look like a steak. He didn't seem to have noticed Ollie, thank fuck. As he and Malcolm passed, Jamie grabbed the back of Glenn's chair and spun him around to face them: Glenn then had a Scot who he assumed had escaped from some experiment on how well humans survived if they were raised by wolves.

He was at least ninety percent certain that Jamie had eaten his surrogate family.

"So, what the fuck is that fucking fuckhead doing fucking sleeping on the fucking job?" Jamie shouted. Ollie attempted to roll onto his side having woken up due to Jamie shouting his head off (predictably), but collapsed after remembering that neither of his arms was fully operational. Glenn could tell that his entire life had flashed before his eyes when he fell, and he was now looking across at Glenn with a completely apathetic expression. "Fucking... fucking Poxbridge over there can get the fuck up or I will fucking break his face!"

"Again," Malcolm added.

"What?" Jamie's head snapped around to stare at Malcolm. Undeterred by his pet wolf, Malcolm stared back.

"'Again'."

"Yes I fucking got that fucking much! What did you fucking MEAN by fucking 'again'?!" Jamie screeched. Glenn had to resist the urge to cover his ears. Malcolm dragged Jamie aside (interestingly, he seemed to go at least relatively willingly) and they conferred quietly for a couple of minutes. Malcolm gestured a lot and Jamie stared up at him like a Jack Russell Terrier after its favourite squeaky bone: Malcolm tended to turn him from being a vicious, snarling hellhound into a nippy lap-dog.

Malcolm and Jamie's deliberation lasted for a couple of minutes, and once they were finished, Malcolm went back over to the sofa on which Ollie was still collapsed. If Jamie hadn't still been looking at Glenn like he was his next meal, he would probably have gone over.

"Hey. Tintin's Sexy Sister!" Malcolm said. Ollie looked up weakly and attempted to nod. "Ye're gonna have to learn to hold your own in a fist-fight if you want to fucking survive here."

"Yes, well this fucker brought a carving knife, an oven and a belt to the fist-fight," Ollie snapped in reply, finally seeming to be coming back to his usual sarcastic self.

Jamie had the look of a man who had seen worse odds as Malcolm dragged him away by the shoulder of his oversized, rumpled suit-jacket.

"What a fucking bastard," Ollie muttered once they were both out of earshot. Glenn nodded.


	2. In Which Glenn Realises Something About Ollie

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Jeez it took me a while to write this
> 
> But yeah TRIGGER WARNINGS FOR PHYSICAL ABUSE AND EMETOPHOBIA in this chapter so yes

Glenn should probably have taken the fact that the door to Ollie's flat was slightly open to be, along with the fact that he had left his laptop back at the DoSAC Head Offices, an indicator that there was at least one thing wrong in the younger man's life. He should probably also have taken these facts to be an indicator that Ollie probably needed to be left alone for the foreseeable future.

However, he did not.

Instead, Ollie's laptop bag in his hand, he pushed the door open. No sign of Ollie himself, but his cat (a Russian Blue calle Dmitri that had followed Ollie home after a particularly heavy night of drinking and had proceeded to install himself in Ollie's flat) was in the hall, staring intently at the closer door to the kitchen. Glenn leaned down and scratched gently behind Dmitri's ear. He meowed at the door.

"Ollie? Are you in?" Glenn called.

There was a brief scuffling of shoes, and then a loud voice called, "Who the fuck is that?!" At first, Glenn dismissed it as Ollie having a "visitor" (he knew that Ollie was at least somewhat inclined to bring people home), but then he heard a muffled yelp and a heavy thud.

Suddenly concerned for Ollie's safety, Glenn pushed the door open. Ollie was sat in the corner, gasping for breath with both hands at his throa. A taller man, considerably stockier than him but otherwise a carbon copy of Ollie, was also there.

"Dad- wait-" Ollie wheezed, then breaking off into a coughing fit as the older man rounded on Glenn. Dmitri ran in the door to Ollie's side with a hiss when Glenn accidentally stood on his tail, fur bristling. The other man - Ollie's father - just shoved Glenn before storming out.

Ollie's head fell forward onto his knees.

"Where do you keep cat food?" Glenn asked, gesturing to Dmitri. Ollie briefly looked up, wordlessly indicated the cupboard just beside Glenn, and then buried his head in his knees again. Dmitri started pawing at his arm, meowing.

"The purple one," Ollie muttered into his legs. Glenn nodded, opening one of the pouches of cat food and pouring it into the bowl. Dmitri trotted over and dug in, purring happily.

"Ollie-"

"Do not breathe a word of this to anybody," Ollie snapped.

"I was going to say I brought your laptop. You left it at DoSAC."

Ollie looked up. "Oh." He looked away from Glenn. "Thanks."

"How long has...?" Glenn hardly wanted to say it, instead watching Ollie pull himself to his feet and check himself over for damage.

"Since mum died."

"When was that?"

"When I was about sixteen. It's hardly let up since."

"I didn't realise she was dead," Glenn said, frowning slightly.

"I don't make a big deal of it." He examined the reflection of his neck in his phone screen, sighing softly as he noticed vaguely handprint-shaped bruises. "Hell, I don't really make anything of it. I don't wanna be pitied - y'know?"

He wasn't lying, Glenn realised. Apart from a small photo of Ollie, his mother and his sister, which Glenn knew Ollie kept in his wallet, Ollie didn't openly keep anything pertaining to his mother.

"So, how did she...?"

"Car crash. Dad's only comment was 'good fucking riddance'." Ollie's nose wrinkled. "You can say the word 'die', you know? This isn't a soap opera; I won't be sent into a deep depression by the mere mention of the word." He frowned, and then put a hand to his neck. "Fuck."

"It's bruised," Glenn said. "Nothing worse, though."

"Good to know you can see through my flesh," Ollie muttered irritatedly.

Sighing, he loosened his tie, and undid the top button of his shirt. Glenn could see the beginnings of another bruise just between his clavicles.

"So - what did he do?" Glenn asked. He was trying to approach the subject sensitively, but it was obvious from the suddenly change in Ollie's expression that he had stepped out of line, and pretty far at that. He started to apologise, but Ollie had already launched into a self-indulgent rant - not that Glenn could begrudge hi the opportunity to complain.

"Oh, you know - just the usual things violently physically abusive parents do. Held me against the wall by my throat. Slapped me around a lot. Nothing out of the fucking ordinary or anything!" His voice was bitter, holding his usual angry sarcasm, but Glenn could hear certain cracks, and very prominently.

"And your neighbours don't know...?"

Ollie wheeled around half way through scrubbing at his face with a cloth, expression half-way between angry and confused. "No, Glenn - they're completely aawre. They just hate me so much and they're so fucking lazy and quintessentially British that they just can't be fucked to do anything about it!" He threw the cloth violently at the sink. "No, of course they don't fucking know!"

He stared Glenn down. "I need to change my bandages. Fuck off."

"Ollie-"

"Fuck off."

"Ollie." Glenn's voice was considerably firmer this time.

"Alright, old man from 'Up!' - just leave me to deal with this in peace bef-before I throw you out th-the fuck... the fuck ou-"

"Before Ollie could finish his sentence, however, he collapsed, Glenn having to make a dash to catch him so he didn't hit his head. Shifting so that Ollie's weight was leaning on him (and despite the fact that he had to be able 6'4" it wasn't much), Glenn helped the younger man over to a chair.

"Do you need me to call somebody?" Glenn asked, worried as he crouched down in front of Ollie in an attempt to meet his eyes.

"'Nambulance. Th-thatd help..." He was shaking violently all over, pale and gasping. "Th'asphyxiation's c-catching up to me, I..." Shaking, he leaned his head forward as he took gasping breaths. Glenn made a hurried call to 99 for an ambulance for Ollie, and when they arrived he sent texts to Malcolm, Terri and Nicola to tell them that Ollie was being rushed to hospital, as a matter of urgency.

* * *

The first thing that Ollie was aware of when he woke up as that there was a tube down his throat. He instantly panicked, but then gentle hands were pushing him back down, a thickly accented voice telling him that he was fine as the tube was painfully pulled out. Ollie coughed and gagged, whimpering.

Then, the medication kicked in.

He slept.

* * *

When Ollie woke up again, Malcolm was by his side, reading. He turned to Ollie when he noticed the younger man moving, propping himself up on his forearms to take in his surroundings.

"Conscious this time, eh, Joe 90?" Malcolm asked, not looking at Ollie.

"Lucid," the younger man corrected. His throat felt stodgy.

"Aye. Well." Malcolm put his book down, handing Ollie his glasses. "Y'had us all worried fer a bit there, lad."

"Glenn didn't... he didn't tell you anything, did he?" Ollie put his glasses on, squinting at Malcolm as his eyes slowly focused on the grey-haired man.

"Nah. Y'can rely on him to provide no fuckin' explanation of anything."

"Good."

"However. You, Foetus Boy, are going to explain this."

Ollie's eyes widened and he shook his head.

"You fucking will. Or I'll get Glenn to."

Ollie shrugged and waved a hand. "I don't want to talk about it."

"We're gonnae find out soon either way," Malcolm replied, although he seemed slightly less vicious than he had done before.

"So ask Glenn. He knows what happened."

At that moment, the door opened and Jamie, tie undone and shirt sleeves rolled up to his elbows, walked in, carrying three cups of coffee. "Well, if the amazing collapsing boy isn't awake!" he cackled gleefully, giving one of the cups of coffee to Ollie. "Drink up - we've got a fuckin' pop quiz for you!"

"No need - he volunteered Glenn," Malcolm said.

At that, a broad, animalistic grin overtook Jamie's face. Ollie sipped at his coffee, watching him, while Malcolm pointedly ignored him, scribbling in what Ollie assumed to be his own private diary.

Ollie looked around the hospital room to see if he had any clothes other than the hospital gown he was wearing, but he gave up quickly when a second dose of morphine began to kick in. "Fuck-" He quickly put his coffee back on the table, Jamie saying something he didn't quite register, at least in full, about Glenn as he reached for the kidney-shaped bowl on the table. Malcolm rubbed a hand over his back as he retched.


End file.
